Java is an innovative programming language that has become the language of choice for programs that need to run-on a variety of different computer systems. First of all Java enables you to write small programs called applets. These are programs that you can embed in Internet web pages to provide some intelligence. Being able to embed executable code in a web page introduces a vast range of exciting possibilities. Instead of being a passive presentation of text and graphics, a web page can be interactive in any way that you want. You can include animations, games, interactive transaction processing – the possibilities are almost unlimited.
Some of the programs on this website have been written in Java, so you will need to install the Java runtime environment in order to run them.
You can download the SDK from Sun for a variety of hardware platforms and operating systems, either directly from the Sun Java web site at http://java.sun.com (for Windows, Solaris, and Linux operating systems), or from sites that you can link to from there. The SDK we are going to use is available from http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4. For instance a version of the SDK for Mac OS is available from http://devworld.apple.com/java/.
